Romantic love today and yesterday

We all have our own opinions about true love. But do we really know what it is?

We are living at a time when love seems to be absent. Love is far from being the motivating influence in the world.

Even movies and games are mostly about violence these days because they reflect the society that we live in.

Is it any wonder that romantic love has taken a back seat? “What is love” becomes a very relevant question.

Shakespeare penned the following words about romantic love more than 4 centuries ago:

‘Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds
Or bends with the remover to remove
O no it is an ever fixed mark
A guide to every wandering bark’

Shakespeare’s intuitive understanding of the real meaning of true love appears right there in the very first line of his sonnet:

“Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds.”

We all change over time. Life changes us and we begin to lose the beauty of our youth. But true love endures through youth and old age; and it can remain constant no matter what changes the loved one undergoes.”

So what has this to do with handwriting?

A great deal!

Because you can read the expression of love in the actual handwriting of a love letter.

Elizabeth Taylor

Take a look at this letter written by Elizabeth Taylor in 1949 at the age of 17 when she was engaged to William Pawley Jr, the son of a wealthy American ambassador.

Picture: dailymail.co.uk

So what can we see in the handwriting?

Firstly the ardour in the forward slanting letters show how hard she is trying to reach out to him. Then there’s also some evidence of a bit of depression as we can see from the downward trend at the end of each line.

There’s passion and fervour in the words that she emphasizes by underlining them as well as in the extra long lower loops that tend to get tangled in the lines below.

Her t-bars show a lot of vigour and persistence – she would not give him up without a fight.

But unfortunately the relationship did turn sour and she debated within herself as to whether she should give the ring back or not.

So you see, the emotion in a love letter stays alive even if the letter goes yellow with age – as we see in the following love letter by the rather exotic Mexican artist

Frida Kahlo

Picture from Maria Popova’s Brain Pickings

Frida Kahlo was a free-spirited and colourful personality. And there is certainly passion in this letter. But there is also an appealing sincerity and a surprising childlike quality in her rather unpretentious and open handwriting.

She was an amazing woman who defeated enormous odds but remained positive and upbeat despite having to put up with a great deal of physical trauma.

Following is an excerpt from Maria Popova’s wonderful blog at www.brainpickings.org

“At a young age, she contracted polio, which left her right leg underdeveloped — an imperfection she’d later come to disguise with her famous colorful skirts. A decade later, as one of only thirty-five female students at Mexico’s prestigious Preparatoria school, she was in a serious traffic accident

“It took her three months in full-body cast to recover and though she eventually willed her way to walking again, she spent the rest of her life battling frequent relapses of extreme pain and enduring frequent hospital visits, including more than thirty operations.

“As a way of occupying herself while bedridden, Kahlo made her first strides in painting — then went on to become one of the most influential painters in modern art.”

A remarkable story about the triumph of the human spirit.

And then of course there are the famous love letters of Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning and much more.